06/03/2026
I don’t often speak of my sexuality. As a bisexual person (especially a woman now married to a man), I have had both the privilege and loneliness of not “needing” to “come out” in a formal way. I’ve never hidden it, but I don’t choose the conversation lightly, and I have wrestled with what I “owe” to other people for a long time because of that.
The truth is, what feels vulnerable about writing this isn’t my sexuality itself. It’s visibility. Like many bisexual people, I’ve experienced the hurt of feeling outcast from both straight and q***r communities alike. Those experiences closed me off…from expressing myself, from feeling part of a community, and from choosing to outwardly identify at all.
Over time, I noticed this same pattern repeating throughout my life: existing between identities. Feeling too much of one thing but not enough of the other. From sexuality and spirituality, to invisible illness and invisible trauma, to how I process and move through the world. I’ve always been one to eat alone rather than feel unwelcome at someone else’s table, so when belonging has felt like it requires too much explanation, I have often chosen to withdraw instead.
When choosing to create The Hermit, I set out to make a tarot card and wound up making a self-portrait. I tend to be naturally introverted, but the depths of isolation I have experienced were truly affecting. Yet within that confinement, I found - and continue to discover - my truth, my art, and my light. This piece became a reflection not of loneliness, but of someone learning to carry their own flame. Of finding value in the in-between places. Of stepping out from time to time, sharing my whole self, and seeking connection with the world.
The Hermit was created for Divinely Q***r, a tarot-themed exhibition opening this Saturday at the Da Vinci Art Alliance. Based on a prompt for q***r artists to reimagine a tarot card in any medium under 5x7”, this hand-forged piece of copper and brass became an unexpectedly direct reflection of my lived experience…and a reminder that being between worlds is not the same thing as being lost.
